


At Home With the Washingtons

by LizzieRH



Series: QPQ shorts [1]
Category: 18th & 19th Century CE RPF, Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: F/F, F/M, Gen, M/M, News Media, QPQVerse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-18
Updated: 2016-04-18
Packaged: 2018-06-03 02:10:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,061
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6592432
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LizzieRH/pseuds/LizzieRH
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the secret gets out, the Washingtons don't know how to quench the media firestorm.</p><p>Quiet media-shy Patsy Custis steps forward to tell America about the family she knows.</p><p>  <em> Set after chapter 14 of OscarthegrouchILOVETRASH's Out of the frying pan/into the fire. </em></p>
            </blockquote>





	At Home With the Washingtons

**Author's Note:**

  * For [rillrill](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rillrill/gifts), [OscarthegrouchILOVETRASH](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OscarthegrouchILOVETRASH/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Out of the frying pan/into the fire](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6426130) by [OscarthegrouchILOVETRASH](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OscarthegrouchILOVETRASH/pseuds/OscarthegrouchILOVETRASH). 
  * Inspired by [Quid Pro Quo](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5880157) by [rillrill](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rillrill/pseuds/rillrill). 



> This fic was written in response to chapter 14 of OscarthegrouchILOVETRASH's _Out of the frying pan/into the fire_ , itself inspired by rillrill's _Quid Pro Quo_. This will not make sense without those stories and I wouldn't want to spoil them so go read them now.
> 
> _Casting: Patsy Custis - Rosario Dawson_

# At Home With The Washingtons by Molly Pitcher

As Patsy Custis Lee welcomes me into her home, those passing by would never realise that this woman was raised by the most powerful man in the world. The windowsill and bookshelves are dotted with medical textbooks and photographs. Pride of place is given to a picture of a young African-American couple on their wedding day. The young couple is, in fact, President and Mrs Washington. Unusually for a wedding photo, a sleeping baby lies in President Washington’s arms.

“They say George loved me from the very moment Mom laid me in his arms. The only place I would sleep, so the story goes, so that's where I went during the ceremony.”

It sounds so weird to hear someone call the President ‘George’ when even his staff call him ‘the General’.

“How old were you…” I ask.

“I’m barely two in that picture but I’ve always been tiny so I fit in his arms for years.”

Another picture, on a beach, Patsy is riding on Washington’s shoulders, eating cotton candy while he and Martha swing a little boy between them.

"Is that Jacky in the picture?”

Jacky Custis is a painful spot for the Washington-Custis family to discuss with the media. The last time they had their family business plastered across the 24 hour news media, Patsy's brother Jack had died in Iraq and protesters had picketed his funeral.

“Did the public’s reaction to Jack’s death make your family more hesitant to broadcasting your family life?”

“It was horrific. I was only a girl. I'm supposed to keep my stress levels down.” Patsy strokes the panic alarm on a string around her neck. “and my world was imploding. Jack was my world and George was the one thing who kept it spinning. He saved my life, you know. The stress of Jack’s death, that’s a real risk factor for a fatal fit. George used to stay up all night, to check I didn’t fit and one night, he couldn’t wake me. I got blue lighted to hospital. The doctors say I came within minutes of death.

George was being pulled in all directions. The press wanted him to publically speak out against the war. The brass wanted him to make Jacky a martyr.  Mom was distraught and Eleanor, Jack’s wife, couldn’t handle the stress. She came to the funeral, for appearance’s sake, but she couldn’t cope. She had to get away from the memories. George and Martha have raised his kids but kept them out of the public eye. While George has been in the White House, I've been raising them here in Virginian suburbia.

When that reporter made a comment about Washington’s stepchildren not speaking to the media, I was apoplectic. Fran and Danny have lives of their own but I wanted to stump for the man who raised me. My doctor said I wouldn’t cope with the travel, especially when pregnant, so George wouldn't allow it."

At this point, I hear a station wagon pull up. A teenage girl enters and offers me a cup of coffee, followed by some younger children. She introduces herself as Nelly Custis, the elder of Jack Custis’ kids. A gentleman in a police uniform, over six feet tall, enters the sitting room. He leans down to kiss Patsy and sat next to her on the sofa and introduces himself as 'Officer Tom Lee, no relation to Charles, I'm the gentleman of the house.'

"So, Tom, what was it like joining the Washington family?"

"Terrifying," he laughs, placing the baby into her arms.

"I knew you'd be fine. George trusts my judgement." Patsy sighed, stroking baby Lizzy's face. "We got engaged the same year that Alexander and George started dating so Alex was meeting us and I was meeting everyone. George looks me up and down, shakes my hand and says 'He'll do' and then wrapped her in a giant bearhug. Five minutes later, Alex is playing Guitar Hero with the kids like he's known them forever."

Then we come to the elephant in the room, the ghost in the air.

"What do you think of the revelations from Gawker magazine?"

"I’m incensed." Patsy said simply.

Tom leant over and held her hand.

“Forty-five years of service to this country and this is how they repay him. When he joined the military, it was illegal to be gay in 49 states of this union. And federally. He was already in Congress when sodomy became legal. You know when the Virginia state legislature repealed their law on gay sex, they had already re-elected a gay senator twice."

"Have you always known George was gay?"

"Not always, I was mid-teens when I realised. We were watching Lord of the Rings on DVD. I told him I thought Orlando Bloom was hot and he agreed but said Viggo Mortenson was hotter. He took it as an opportunity to talk about Sir Ian McKellen and his advocacy."

"So he never brought any of his boyfriends home."

"He and Mom are great friends but I could see how happy he looked when he came home from his weekends away. The first boy he brought home was Alex. That first Thanksgiving was wonderful."

"How about your mother?"

"It's always been Eliza, for years now. My family is my mother, her girlfriend, my step-father, his boyfriend, my husband, my daughter, my siblings and their children."

"Should they have been open with the media?"

"No, the media has no business policing what consenting adults do in the privacy of their own homes."

"What about his comment that there should be transparency in all levels of government?"

"None of them broke any laws." She hands me a picture to me. George, Martha, Alex and Eliza are all sat round a table in a beach-side restaurant, sipping cocktails and grinning, in an arrangement that could have been read one way before and another way now. "Who cares who is having sex with who? They are a family. They are my family."

* * *

_Molly sits at the table in Washington's private dining room, locking her article for publication, as Alexander Hamilton brings her more coffee._

_"Do you think it will help?" he asks._

_"We've been doing this since you were in high school, lad." she says._

_She looks at President Washington and Deborah and then she presses PUBLISH!_

**Author's Note:**

> Notes: If you are wondering which the state is only one to have legalised 'homosexual behavior' or 'sodomy' before 1972, it's Illinois.
> 
> Thanks for reading. Let me know what you thought.


End file.
